Chanting Monks Magnet

This magnet is a wonderful decorative item for all year! Medievalists and musicians alike will certainly adore it. 

Cantate Domino canticum novum—“Sing to the Lord a new song.” This psalm, 97, began the division sung at Matins on Saturdays. It was traditionally illustrated with an image of clerics chanting.

In this initial C, the monumental figures of four tonsured clerics cluster beneath the arches of a church, lamps dangling from the ceiling. They gaze in different directions. The figure at the front grasps a music manuscript that rests on an elaborate lectern, its support in the form of a fish. Two other clerics peer over his shoulder, while a fourth, at back, seems to know text and music by heart—his eyes are closed but his mouth open in song. 

This product was created to accompany the exhibition Sing a New Song: The Psalms in Medieval Art and Life on view at the Morgan Library & Museum September 12, 2025 through January 4, 2026.